Apple has done a pretty good job of keeping emulator software apps off of its iOS devices, mainly because it believes that such software encourages piracy, but a new app that allows users to emulate Nintendo games has managed to find a loophole. The program is called GBA4iOS, and as its name implies, it allows you to emulate Game Boy Advance games on iOS devices such as iPad, iPhone or iPod Touch. The software was created by Riley Testut, who also created a Super NES emulator for iOS devices.

Normally Apple would kill this app if it was on the App Store, but GBA4iOS takes advantage of a very complicated loophole that keeps it safe: it uses GitHub. According to ReadWrite the developer loaded the app's code to GitHub, then handed the information over to MacBuildServer, a company that compiles raw code into functional apps. The idea is that MacBuildServer acquires the needed certificates from Apple that then allow iOS users to download apps directly through GitHub, under the guise of testing an app. The real loophole in this scenario is that GitHub doesn't actually require that certification from Apple for a compiled app to reside on its service.

Of course, in order to "test" such an application, you'll need ROMs of games. Downloading ROMs is generally considered piracy and copyright infringement. Still it isn't all that farfetched for someone to find homebrew software for the GBA on the Internet..

We will have to see if Nintendo or Apple decide to find some way of making this emulation app disappear.